Wednesday, 07 May 2014

Zoe slept well again last night, but not quite as well as the previous night.

Today was our expedition to Movie
World. It's a theme park I've never bothered to go to until now. Back when
it first came out, it was themed around a bunch of movies I hadn't seen at the
time, and so it didn't hold a lot of interest to me. It's the third theme park
on our VIP theme park pass, and with the weather cooling down to the point
where Wet n Wild isn't feasible any more, I figured we'd use the remaining time
on our passes to explore this (and possibly another trip to Seaworld).

The park's main street opens at 9:30am, but the rides don't open until 10am. We
were there a bit after 9:30am, and got good parking, but really couldn't do
much of anything until 10am. The place is kind of a half-baked cross between
Disneyland and Universal Studios. Overly loud dramatic movie score is piped
throughout the "main street", which is vaguely reminiscent of Disneyland's
Downtown District.

Zoe's a bit keen on Scooby Doo, so the first ride I thought we'd try out was
that one. The line ended up being long and slow, so I suggested we come back
when it had settled down, and we went to the kid's area and rode the Road
Runner roller coaster ad nauseum. Zoe absolutely loved it. It was a pretty good
roller coaster, and it was great that she was tall enough to be able to ride
it. That kid has no fear, and we were able to stay on it without getting off
for a few continuous rounds before we had to get off and re-queue.

After that we went back to the Scooby Doo ride, and much to Zoe's
disappointment, we discovered I'd misread the height restriction, and she was
too short. I think we tried going to the Wild West ride after that, but it was
having mechanical issues, and was temporarily closed, so we went to the Justice
League ride instead. Funnily enough, that was the one ride that Zoe was briefly
unsettled on, and it was basically a glorified haunted house ride with laser
guns. Clearly she's not bothered by roller coasters, but something with a scary
plot line and no G-forces is another story.

We had some lunch and went on some of the more pedestrian rides after lunch to
let our stomachs settle, and then went on the Wild West ride. That one was
Zoe's favourite for the day, and we went on it twice, before coming back to do
the Road Runner roller coaster one last time.

It was a really good day out, and it was good that there were a few "bigger
kid" options for Zoe as well as the tame stuff like the carousel and the lamest
dodgem cars I've ever seen. I liked that Zoe really didn't hit her limit on any
of the rides. I hope we'll make it back at least one more time before our
passes expire.

We dropped in super briefly on my cousin, who lives 10 minutes away from Movie
World on the way home for a quick play with her daughters, and then I dropped
Zoe directly to Sarah to save mucking around. Zoe fell asleep on the way back.